


one nation, under Peggy Carter, with liberty and justice for all

by charleybradburies



Category: Agent Carter (TV), Captain America (Movies), Marvel, Marvel (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Assassination Attempt(s), BAMF Peggy Carter, Badass SHIELD Agents, Bickering, Canon Disabled Character, Canon-Typical Violence, Character(s) of Color, Children, Community: 1_million_words, Elementary School, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Female-Centric, Friendship, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Historical, Historical References, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Loss, Married Couple, Murder, No Sex, Not Canon Compliant, Original Character(s), POV Female Character, Past Character Death, Past Peggy Carter/Steve Rogers, Past Relationship(s), Period-Typical Racism, Post-Loss, Post-War, Private School, Racism, Racist Language, SHIELD, School, Teacher-Student Relationship, Teaching, Team Dynamics, Tumblr Ask Box Fic, Undercover, Undercover Missions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-06
Updated: 2015-03-06
Packaged: 2018-03-16 14:19:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,735
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3491525
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/charleybradburies/pseuds/charleybradburies
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Howard sends Peggy on a Very Special Assignment.</p>
            </blockquote>





	one nation, under Peggy Carter, with liberty and justice for all

**Author's Note:**

> A) In reference to African Americans, the majority of the characters herein use the terms that nowadays are considered racially insensitive. It is important for me to point out that in the 1940s, "black" carried harsher stigma than the words "Negro" or "colored." Many people of those descriptors used them of their own volition, particularly through the 1960s. It was not until the successes of the Civil Rights Movement that "black" began to be promoted by activists, and the term African American came into encouraged use at the tail end of the 1980s. I've done the best I can to make all references historically accurate, and while I hope that there is nothing that warrants offense in the context of this being a written work of fiction, I am willing to address any concerns or incorporate information from relevant material.
> 
> b) Ruth Powell was indeed a real person: a Civil Rights activist who, as a young adult and a Howard University student, had what were then called sittings, but what we know of as sit-ins. She is mentioned practically in passing in this piece, but I do feel it's appropriate to acknowledge and appreciate her contribution both to the United States' journey of civil rights activism and to the repertoire of historical knowledge from which I was able to parse details with which to enrich the context of my writing. (In this piece, she would have been 27 or 28, a few years younger than Peggy.)
> 
> c) Shout out to [a private school in DC, whose name I won't put for privacy reasons], for hiring my lovely stepmother as one of their librarians, and for renovating their library this past year and subsequently supplying me with inspiration for a plot device I doubt I'd have thought up otherwise.
> 
> d) It's only mentioned a single time, but the school herein is named after Mary Todd (President Lincoln's wife).

September, 1949

//

“Got a special assignment for you, Peg,” Howard says, almost as soon as she and Daniel pass through the doors into the office.

“Thought you once said all my assignments were special.”

“They are, cause you are, but _this_ is even more special.”

“Although, apparently not special enough for a hello,” she gives him a maternally scolding look. He bows his head for a moment, but continues speaking. 

“So, a few years ago, a friend of mine was helping get this school back on its feet after the war, and I lent some money to help them out-"

“How _much_ money is some money?” Daniel asks smartly, in the process of sitting down.

“Not important. What _is_ important is that they need some more help. It's in an awkward area between a well-off neighborhood and a…not-so-well-off one, and recently some of the more well off people haven't been too happy with kids they've been admitting. Most of those kids are on scholarship, with the money I've given. I've even made sure to give enough to get their uniforms and have them be able to get over to the school from wherever they live. Nice lot of kids.”

“But?” Peggy presses.

“Most of those kids are Negro.”

“And that's what people are having a problem with.”

Howard nods. 

“So what am I to do about that?”

“Protection detail, basically. I sent them an edited resume of yours and you're gonna replace a teacher who's about to go on maternity leave.”

“Oh.”

“I know it's not like anything we've done before, but I need eyes - and guns - in that school, Peg. I mean, these are _kids_ we’re talking about.”

“And you honestly believe it may become violent? That would be the only possible excuse for sending an armed agent into a school. As you said, they _are_ children.”

“It appears to be getting there,” Howard says softly, and the atmosphere of the room falls to a settled sort of anxiety. Peggy is the one who breaks the silence a few moments later.

“When do I start?”

//

October, 1949

Day One

//

“Mizzz Carter,” a few of the children slur after she puts her name on the board, having grown to the age at which they know the way to pronounce her somewhat ambiguous title, and she smiles to herself as she sets the chalk down in the metal rut underneath the board. 

_At least I don’t have to teach them how to pronounce Sousa,_ she thinks. _That may have been rather difficult; somehow many adults still have trouble with that._

When she turns around, she sees a small girl with her blonde hair done in surprisingly long pigtails, whose right arm is stretched as far above her head as she can possibly reach. Peggy suppresses a laugh. 

“Yes, darling?” she says in her most motherly voice. She’ll have to keep it on all day, and she’s started to worry she’s not really ready for that.

“Miz Carta, where’s Missus Marcus?” the little girl inquires, and demurely stuffs her hand down into her lap with the other.

“Mrs Marcus has gone off on maternity leave,” Peggy answers, and the classroom lights up with small, excited chatter. “I’ll be here until her doctor decides she’s ready to up and face you little rascals again.”

She reaches over the large mahogany desk that’s now hers for the time being to grab her folder, and they laugh cordially at her comment.

“Well, now that you know my name, I ought to know yours, don’t you think?”

She pulls the attendance sheet from her folder, and puts on the reading glasses Daniel’s convinced she needs, more for dramatic effect than actual use, and out of habit the majority of the students sit themselves straight up in their seats. Hands cupped together on top of the desk, legs and feet still, outerwear hung up on the pegs on the wall by the door and lunch-boxes inside desks along with their homework…Peggy’s own school days have long since seemed another life away, and it’s standing in front of her class that she feels sorry for every teacher she’d given Hell.

Her days as a schoolchild may have felt a lifetime ago, but her time in the military and the government were a different story.

She clears her throat, setting her eyes sternly towards a group of boys at the back of the classroom who’ve continued to swing their legs and whisper amongst themselves. It starts with one, and then the others, and by the time the penultimate bell has gone off, perhaps a minute later, the entire class is upright, still, and silent. Almost all white, but that’s what she’d expected. The almost part was why she was there, or rather, some people’s lack of acceptance of that.

“Very well, then.”

She wheels her chair out, takes a seat, and grabs a pen.

“Anderson, Abigail.”

“Present, Ma’am!”

“Pleasure to meet you, Abigail.”

“Likewise, Ms Carter,” the girl - in the front row and with alabaster skin and a single brown braid hanging down her back - says uncertainly. 

“Are you quite sure about that?” Peggy follows, her voice soft. A couple children start to laugh, and she holds up a hand, which promptly stops them. 

“It’s just…normally I’m called Abbie, Ma’am.”

“Oh! That’s quite all right, Abbie.” 

Peggy makes a point of enunciating the girl’s name, and sees that she relaxes quite a bit.

“Are there any other students who do not prefer to be addressed by their given names?” she continues, gesturing for a show of hands. A few of them fly up, and she takes their attendance first before returning to alphabetical order, making sure to wink at Abbie when she shares her dislike for the name Margaret and for the nickname Marge, both names which many people have insisted upon calling her.

They’ve only a moment to sit around - just barely enough time for the homework to be passed in - before another bell rings. Principal Hartmann’s voice comes on by public address a few seconds later, and the children stand at his command. Peggy checks swiftly for their hands on their hearts, and turns toward the flag herself. 

“I pledge allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands; one Nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.”

The chorus of voices repeats the words, almost robotically, and as every other time she’s said it since the war, it hurts. She knew what it meant to stand by such a pledge, to fight for their country, for another country, for the bloody Captain America himself!

But of course, she was the only soul here who knew that.

//

Day Eleven

//

“Hey! That’s mine! Give it back!” 

Little Abbie’s voice is shrill and demanding, but the boys’ laughs are cruel and loud. Peggy sees them dart across their makeshift baseball diamond, one with something in his hand, and Abbie sprinting after the trio, perhaps ten or fifteen meters behind at the most. 

All seems well enough on the other side of the schoolyard that Peggy decides to run over to them, thankful that Daniel had discouraged her from wearing heels today. 

They stop running immediately when they notice that she’s in their path, and the one holding whatever it is they’d taken from Abbie starts looking abashedly at the ground.

She sets her hands on her hips.

“Well?”

All of their eyes snap towards her just as Abbie makes it to her side. It’s a lunchbox, Peggy notes. A Captain America lunchbox. 

_Oh, bloody Hell._

“Explain yourselves.”

One of them opens his mouth to talk, but doesn’t seem to be able to say anything. Tears have been streaming down Abbie’s face, she can see when she looks down, and she strokes the girl’s hair gently. 

“Give your classmate back her lunchbox. Immediately.”

The boy practically throws it at her, and Abbie pulls it tight to her chest. Peggy clears her throat.

“Sorry, Ms Carter. Sorry, Abbie,” the boys say in monotone unison, looking at Peggy, seemingly in fear of her next command.

“That was a weak apology, boys. But no matter: go back inside, return to your assigned seats. By the end of the recess period, I expect one page from each of you on my desk - about why you stole this lunchbox and why it was wrong to do so.”

“Yes, Ms Carter.” 

They shuffle off, and Peggy extends a hand to Abbie and leads her back toward the school building.

“Thank you, Ms Carter,” the girl says quietly a moment later. 

“But of course, darling.”

Abbie pulls herself up onto a bench against the wall of the building and takes a seat, still clutching the lunchbox.

“You keep that very close to heart, don’t you?” Peggy asks, sitting down next to her. She scans the yard closely enough to know that nothing’s awry, and turns attention back to the little girl.

“It’s my favoritest thing!” Abbie exclaims. “Sorry, favorite.”

Peggy giggles.

“And why is that?”

Abbie pauses, visibly less comfortable. Peggy waits for her to decide whether or not she wants to divulge the information.

“Well, firstly, because it’s Captain America, and Captain America was really swell. I mean, I didn’t know him, of course, but he seems like he was a really swell guy.”

“That he was,” Peggy mutters, and Abbie’s face lights up. She loosens her hold on the lunchbox.

“You knew him?”

“Briefly, yes. I’ve known a great many people who served. He was indeed one of the best, both as a soldier and as a man.”

“Only _one_ of the best?”

Peggy smiles, reaching into the breast pocket of her jacket and pulling out a wallet-sized photograph. Abbie takes it from her gently.

“That’s you!”

“That’s a photo from my wedding, yes. Both my husband and I served.”

“You, too?”

“Mmm-hmm.”

“Wasn’t it scary?”

“A lot of things are scary. That doesn’t mean we should not do them.”

Abbie grins, handing the photograph back to her. She scoots away from Peggy and sets the lunchbox between them. She flicks it open and takes out a small box that Peggy recognizes well.

“You keep a Purple Heart in your lunchbox, Abbie?”

The girl’s voice gets soft again.

“My daddy left when I was real little. My momma made him. This is all I got left.”

 _First Sergeant Anderson…_ Peggy recalls the story. _Poor girl._

“Do you remember your daddy, Abbie?”

“Not well, no. I only remember a few things, which is real odd, because I still miss him a whole lot.”

“Sometimes missing people is like that.”

“What do you do, Ms Carter? When you’re missing somebody a whole lot?”

“Well, Abbie…you’ve got to love the ones you’ve got.” 

“Like your husband and my momma?”

“Precisely. Of course, it’s not as simple as it sounds - almost nothing ever is - but a good faith effort is always worth making.”

//

Day Twelve

//

“I wonder what your Captain Rogers would think of all this publicity he’s gotten,” Daniel says, his voice gentle almost to the point of teasing. Peggy chuckles. 

“I’m grateful that Betty Carver wasn’t a particularly popular character,” she says, checking her lipstick in her mirror, and Daniel laughs.

“You would never get away from that.”

“The character’s not been connected to-"

“Oh, I know that you aren’t publicly associated with the character. I was talking about myself.”

Daniel looks over at her, and she rolls her eyes.

“Well, at least I know you didn’t marry me for celebrity.”

“You give yourself so little credit, Peg! You’re America’s best girl! The acclaimed Agent Carter!”

A touch of his easy tone remains, but she knows he’s being genuine.

“So everyone keeps telling me,” she smiles back at him, but her half-feigned enthusiasm is cut off by the increasingly loud sound of shouts ahead. 

“Another protest?” Daniel suggests.

“Must be,” Peggy sighs.

 _Send the Niggers Home,_ says the first sign she’s able to read.

She shakes her head furiously.

“A single private school in a single city, and all these white men have nothing better to do than intimidate children. Pathetic.”

Daniel turns into the driveway in front of the school, and pulls over to the sidewalk.

“They’re having trouble getting in, aren’t they?” he realizes, seeing a group of students near the door, and Peggy nods. She slings her messenger over her shoulder and leans over to kiss Daniel good-bye.

A few of the children trying to push their way inside are children that she recognizes, and her heart hurts seeing the frightened expressions on their faces; the ache gives way almost immediately to the boiling in her blood at the anger on those of the protesters. She stomps over to the front steps.

The man on the edge of the first step takes too good a look at her as she’s approaching. He whistles at her, and it takes an inordinate amount of effort to keep herself from rolling her eyes or punching him.

“Look at this pretty dame,” he muses arrogantly, lowering the “no niggers here” sign to his side.

Peggy smiles bitterly.

“Firstly, back off. _Secondly,_ back off. Thirdly, I am a teacher at this school, and that warrants respect. Fourthly, I’m married.”

“Well, sweetheart, your husband must not have too good a job, if you’re still working.”

“Actually, he’s a veteran, and an esteemed federal agent-"

“Who’s really not pleased with the way you’re talking to his wife,” the aggressive addition to her own retort comes from behind her. She focuses her glare on the protester rather than turning around; he momentarily looks unsure, then he steadies himself again.

“You see, Mista Crutch-"

“ _Agent_ Crutch, actually.”

“Mister Agent Crutch, ain’t it true we gots the rights to assembly and expression?”

“You're not _wrong,”_ Daniel replies acerbically. “However, these children have a right to an education, and my wife has the right not to be harassed, and I have the right to shoot you should you continue impinging on those rights.”

The protester sneers. 

“Look at this fancy feller. Ya gots a dictionary in ya suit coat, Mister Agent Crutch? Some ritzy words there.”

Peggy hears the telltale sound of Daniel’s gun being cocked, and she starts to unzip her purse.

The protester, still wearing his jeering look, turns back to his companions, and gestures for them to walk away from the school.

“This ain’t over,” he says when passing Daniel, after giving Peggy another once-over.

“I expect not,” Daniel replies darkly.

“Go on inside, children,” Peggy turns back to the line of nervous students to say, and most of them rush inside. Two of the girls, however, are in her class, and they run over to her instead. Abbie immediately slings her arms around Peggy’s waist, unintentionally hitting her hip with her lunchbox.

“You must be Mistah Carter,” she greets Daniel excitedly.

“I am, but who are you?” he responds lightly, extending a hand towards her. She moves so that she’s standing beside Peggy rather than wrapped around her, and puts her hand in his.

“Abbie Anderson, sir.”

“Pleasure to meet you, Miss Anderson.”

“Likewise, Mistah Carter.”

He glances at the other girl, and she hastily puts her hand forward, the bobble-sporting ponytail holders at the bottoms of her braids bouncing as she moves.

“Gin - I mean, Virginia Thomas, sir.”

“Pleasure to meet you as well, Miss Thomas.”

Both of the little girls smile, and Peggy places her head on Abbie’s so that Abbie looks up at her.

“Go on inside, girls. I’ll see you in a moment.”

“Yes, Ms Carter!”

They skip off, hand-in-hand, and Daniel silently questions Peggy’s knowledge of the Captain America lunchbox.

“Agent Crutch?” she says jokingly, putting a hand on his shoulder as they stand closer to each other.

“Eh, sounds a little like a superhero name, doesn't it?”

“Don't go getting any ridiculous ideas about saving the city singlehandedly or anything like that.”

“Well, not _singlehandedly:_ I got you, and on a good day, Thompson and I get along all right.”

He chuckles, and she looks at him disapprovingly. He leans forward and presses a gentle kiss to her forehead.

“I do hope you're not late for work, darling.”

He shrugs. 

“Duty doesn't always call from the office. I think my coworkers will understand.”

“They’d better,” she says, pulling him into a kiss. “They’ll be getting an earful from me if they don’t.”

He pulls her tighter and kisses her again.

//

Day Eighteen

//

When he comes in, Daniel slams his briefcase on the kitchen table with a curse; when he realizes Peggy is sitting in the living room, he starts to apologize, but she doesn’t let him, instead going over and kissing him gently. He pulls her flush to his body and deepens the kiss desirously, and when they break apart after a few minutes, Peggy squats down and pulls his fallen crutch from the floor. 

“He was twenty-seven, Peg. Twenty-seven. And these guys may well get away with this. Reggie Howard’s kids are gonna grow up knowing that he…” 

Daniel’s voice, full of mourning, trails off. “He was murdered trying to pick his children up from school.”

He sighs harshly, and a stream of tears drip from his eyes. Peggy gestures for him to head towards the couch, and he quickly crutches over. She sits down next to him, laying a tender hand on his knee.

“After the war - God! after Leviathan - I thought I could despise no human being’s behavior as much. We sprinted through Hell, and we made it back, and it felt like I’d seen it all, but this…”

She runs a few fingers through his hair, and eventually he looks up at her.

“This is vile. But they _will_ pay for it, Daniel. We will be sure of it,” Peggy says, as assuredly as she can. One of his hands grasps the one of hers in his lap as he nods, and he raises them to his lips so as to kiss her ring finger. A weak smile graces her face for a moment, and then she leans into the corner of the couch and stretches an arm around him. He leans into her shoulder, wrapping one arm around her waist as he shifts his body towards hers, his hand settling itself at her hip.

“Besides…” she murmurs after they’ve been sitting on the couch soaking in their melancholy for quite some time, “I _am_ the acclaimed Agent Carter, after all.”

Being the only one of them to use the accolade, Daniel easily realizes that her easier tone is more of confidence and intent than self-importance, and he smiles up at her for a few seconds before pressing a sweet kiss to her clavicle.

“I know you are,” he replies in a tone similar to hers, though some of his sadness remains in his voice. “I married you for a reason, you know.”

Peggy gasps playfully, and shoves herself up off the couch abruptly. Slowly tiptoeing back towards their bedroom, she keeps her expression of teasing shock on her face until he’s pressed her up against the wall and begun to kiss her. 

//

Day Twenty-Two

//

She’s writing the week’s vocabulary words by the right edge of the board when the warning comes. The sound of the public address system flicking on cues the entire room to still themselves and wait for instruction, but Peggy is the only one who knew that there had been even a sliver of a chance of the words that followed. 

_Lockdown._

As previously instructed, she treads softly over to the classroom door, locking it and pulling down the blinds. She presses her eyes shut and forces herself to take a deep breath. The children's frightened murmurs and whimpers will make this a harder mission than most.

“Abbie, darling?”

“Yes, Ms Carter?” the girl responds meekly.

“Would you and another girl be dears and carefully close the shades of the windows?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Peggy opens her eyes again, and her peripheral vision catches Abbie pulling poor Ginny by her hand over to the far wall of the classroom. Having assembled themselves in a conglomeration against the back wall, the young students seem even more scared than they had when the lockdown had been announced. 

“Thank you,” Peggy whispers as the girls crawl back over to their classmates.

She goes to the first window of the far wall, and peeks out into the cul-de-sac. 

_A gunman._

_White. Male. In his late 30s or early 40s. Muscular. Well-dressed, clean-shaven. Roughly 6’, 190lbs. No discernible military training._

_Ithaca Model 37, likely fully loaded._

Leaning her head against the wall, she can faintly hear that the front entryway of the school has been built strongly enough to prevent his entry to the building. 

_Howard_ had _said that there were renovations done with the money he’d donated…the doors weren't particularly heavy, but of course, if they were of Howard's invention, there was no telling how meticulously they'd been designed._

How tragic it was that they lived in a world where it was warranted to use military grade bullet- and fire- proof glass in the doors of a school.

What was not tragic, however, was that she knew how to stop gunmen.

Peggy walks back over to her desk, and pulls the largest drawer open. 

“Children, please close your eyes.”

A couple soft voices reply their compliance, but most of the children don’t speak, and simply obey. 

She turns around, and undoes her button-up. She straps herself into her vest, wincing at a gasp she hears from the other side of the room. 

Abbie, of course. Arms wrapped nervously around her legs, but her eyes wide open. 

Peggy doesn’t care to scold her. She raises a finger to her lips, urging Abbie to remain silent, and the little girl nods, even though her face is creased with worry. 

The gunman is getting more frustrated - Peggy hears a rapid-fire assault on the door as she’s buttoning her shirt back up.

“There are dozens of other doors, fat-head,” she accidentally mutters, and Abbie and a couple other children giggle. She shushes them before telling the class that they may open their eyes again.

“That’s one reason not to be afraid,” she says, trying to be soothing. “He doesn’t seem particularly good at this. And whatever it is he wants, he won’t be getting it. Do you all understand?”

“Yes, Ms Carter.”

“Good.”

She reaches into another drawer, wishing they didn’t have to see what she’s pulling out. They’d hear it anyway, she figures, so it’s no use to continue to try to conceal it.

A few gasps join the mechanical sounds of her gun in filling the air with nervous noise. 

“Eyes on me.”

There’s a slight shifting in the back of the room, and she waits a moment.

“Listen carefully: all of you are to stay right here until further notice. In the case that it becomes necessary for you to move in order to be safe, you will use your combined judgment as to what is safest, and you will all remain together, no exceptions. Is that clear?”

“Yes, Ms Carter,” every one of the students responds. Many of the girls seem to be growing even more nervous. 

As she starts towards the door, she hears the scuffing of shoes, and turns to see Abbie coming at her quickly. She hugs her so tightly that it’s nearly painful, but Peggy doesn’t push her away. She presses a gentle kiss to the girl’s head, and she pulls away herself. 

She raises her hand in a salute, and after a few seconds, Abbie returns the gesture. The other children raise their hands in the same way when Peggy looks back once more and gives a nod. 

“Abbie?”

“Yes, Ms Carter?”

“Please lock the door behind me, darling.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

The halls, of course, are empty to the point of eeriness, and Peggy finds herself needing to steady her breath as she processes down them, winding her way towards the front lobby. She reaches it to find that the gunman had indeed moved on. The doors are marked with scars from the fray they’d faced, and a series of wasted bullets lays in front of the door, having fallen after being shot at the glass. The large bicycle lock that had creatively been used to ensure the steadfastness of the doors has lost a fair bit of the topmost layer of paint, as it had chafed against the door handles. 

There isn’t a room in sight wherein the lights have been left on, but she recalls being informed that the old library was being reconstructed. No one, save for construction workers who came on the weekends, had used the room since the school had let out for the summer. 

It isn’t locked, and almost as though God had been paying particularly keen attention, a tall stool has been leaned against the nearest wall. Standing on the topmost step she pops one of the ceiling tiles out of place and pulls herself up into the duct.

She crawls as quietly as she can manage to the right, and prays that she reaches her destination. She meets a loosened tile after she’s gone about twenty feet, and takes a leap of faith in prying it upwards. 

The room is dark, but familiar. 

She drops into Principal Hartmann’s office with expert grace. 

“Missus Carter?” he whispers, his voice shrill with shock.

“Is your telephone operable, Mister Hartmann?” she asks, forcing her voice to be steady and low. He nods shakily, and she sets her gun on the desk next to it before turning it around to face her.

“Hello?” Jack’s voice is tentative, and with good reason - this number is _quite_ restricted.

“Thompson,” she says quietly, and she can hear him draw in his breath. She doesn’t bother giving him a chance to reply.

“Code Red at Mary Todd.”

“Copy that, Carter.”

“Come in through a side door.”

“Damage?”

“Front door. Nothing else I know of. Single gunman, little or no training, white, 6’, 190. Ithaca 37. Civilian.”

“Be there soon. Moderate backup. We’ll keep the exits. Do your best to isolate and neutralize. And Peggy?”

“Yes, Jack?”

“Stay safe.”

“Same to you.”

She returns the telephone to its original position, picks up her gun, and meets the principal’s eyes. Still in the corner of his office, trembling, he seems reticent to even attempt a conclusion at what’s just happened. She orders him to follow protocol and her lead and to remain aware of his surroundings, and uses his desk chair to pop back up into the duct. She backtracks to the library and makes her way back to the front corridor. 

There are a few weak echoes throughout the area, and the school building’s fanciful design makes estimating her proximity to anything or anyone much more difficult. She damns Howard under her breath and makes herself press on, all too aware that the slow, tedious process by which she must move will prove counterproductive if the gunman is able to discern her location before she is able to discern his. 

Well, if it came to it, she wasn’t such a purist about protocol that she would let anyone get hurt on her watch for want of following the rules, let alone a child. 

She’s practiced with her high heels, enough so that even against the linoleum floor they barely click as she pads around the building, but as she heads down one hallway, a heavier set of steps joins their soft patter from a perpendicular hall. 

“The gymnasium is at the end of that hall,” Peggy muses quietly to herself. “Is there something going on in the-"

 _Ruth Powell,_ she realizes. They’d brought Ruth Powell in as a guest speaker for students, to talk about her sittings. 

Both sets of footsteps remain steady, until Peggy hears a loud thunk, and a number of shrieks. 

_Oh, bloody hell._

She rushes into the other hall; the gymnasium door’s been kicked open and as it slowly drifts closed behind its assailant a pair of leather shoes peeks through. A gun is cocked, and she starts to run, slipping in the door right before it closes.

A mass of children, and five women - four white teachers, and their Negro guest - stand huddled together at one end of the gymnasium, and the gunman is in the middle of the room, his weapon hoisted up on his shoulder. He’s looking with contempt at Ruth Powell - the only person keeping their back straight standing against him. He doesn’t notice Peggy’s presence, but Powell does, and even though his gun is pointed at her, she steps forward. Peggy moves nearer and nearer to the gunman, her own gun cradled in her hands. 

“Damned niggers,” the man slurs angrily. “You don’t belong here.”

He starts to lift his gun a bit higher, and Peggy takes her chance.

“Interestingly enough, neither do you,” she says declaratively, cocking her gun and raising it. Now less than half a foot from him, there wouldn’t be a chance even in a frozen Hell that she could miss her shot.

 _“You_ belong in prison.”

“For what?” he jeers, turning to face her. “Speaking God’s truth?”

“I sincerely doubt that God would find your reasons for brandishing your weapon at children at all justifiable.”

“Oh? And are you an authority on that? Maybe I’ll ask Him if He’s spoken His truth to you?”

“Well, the longer your weapon remains aimed at Miss Powell, the sooner you will see Him. Tell Him that Agent Margaret Carter of the United States Government says hello.”

His face hardens even more, and she knows it’s with the realization that she’s wholly capable of following through on such a threat as she’s just made. The door in the back of the gymnasium budges, and though the words are unclear, a series of authoritative shouts from immediately outside it are audible. With the intervals of a couple of seconds, there are a number of crashes against the door.

“Put down your weapon, slowly,” Peggy orders, but the gunman’s reticence and the furrowing of his brow cues her onto the fact that some other thought entirely is working its way through his brain. He drops the shotgun to his side, but a second later darts for the door behind Peggy. Unfortunately for him, she’s quicker, and he receives a hard jab of her knee to his stomach before he gets past her. The subsequent punch to the face makes him drop the shotgun, and by whatever miracle, it doesn’t discharge. He reaches out for her gun, and with only a moment’s questioning, she lands a fervent kick to his groin. He collapses to the floor with a loud curse, and she returns her gun to the holster at her waist. 

She simultaneously reaches for his shotgun and presses one of her feet onto his back, letting the heel dig a little into his spine, to keep him on the floor. A heavy sigh of relief fills the room from all its denizens, and a moment later, the door leading outside bursts open like the top of a shaken pop bottle, having finally been breached. 

Thompson strides over to her swiftly, whipping his handcuffs out of his jacket pocket and snapping them onto the gunman’s wrists as she lifts her leg. 

“So here’s the question: I had _you_ on the ground - did I really need to show up at all?”

“I have teaching to do, Captain Thompson. I’m not available to escort our new friend back to the office.”

“Ah, yes. That’s why I keep you around, you know - to remind me what I’m actually good for.”

“Well, it’s surely not for humor,” she teases, and he rolls his eyes and yanks the gunman to his feet.

//

November, 1949

Day Thirty-Six

//

Winter is on its way now, Peggy can tell. The park bench presses icily against her, chilling her through her dress. The children she’s watching don’t seem to have noticed, although their mothers had made them bundle up; they chase each other around the playground with abandon. 

Abbie and Ginny drag the youngest girl around behind them, demonstrating the various pieces of the apparatus. 

“Reggie used to love coming to the playground with us,” the woman next to Peggy says, the sweet memory bitter on her tongue. “Penny keeps thinkin’ her Daddy’s gonna come back. I don’t have the heart to keep tellin’ her.”

“This is the time to mourn, Alma. The sadness will not fill you forever.”

Alma lets out half a chuckle of disbelief, wiping her tears away with the light brown skin of her palm, which Peggy thinks stands in lovely contrast to the pink on her fingernails and the deep brown pigment of the skin elsewhere on her body. 

“I lost my first love. In the war. I still had some purpose, but I thought I’d lost all chance of love, of a life at all, outside of my work. I’ve since come to see my life differently, having been proven wrong about the necessity of love, of connection. It still aches, but I do not feel deadened by the loss any longer, and I know that - that Steve would far rather I be happy, that I lead a fulfilling life, than that I get so caught up in mourning him that I forget about myself. I daresay your husband would feel the same way.” 

She reaches out for Alma’s hand, and Alma responds more enthusiastically than she’d expected, pulling her in for a hug. They grip each other tightly for a short moment, before their relative quiet is interrupted by the shouts of Alma’s eldest. 

“Momma! Missus Carter! Look at this!” 

Janie, a girl of nine, stands at the platform before the jungle gym at the edge of the playground, and once she sees that both of the women have their gazes fixed on her, she stretches her left arm forward and jolts herself upward, swinging about on the bars until she reaches the other end. She propels herself to the ground and sticks the landing with her arms above her head as though she had been in a competition, and Peggy and Alma clap. Her smile grows wide, and she rushes off to do something else.

This time, it’s Alma who reaches for Peggy’s hand.


End file.
